Back to the Future: Carter, Obama, and Clean Energy in America

By

Keith Johnson

Jul 15, 2009 8:46 am ET

Thirty years ago today, President Jimmy Carter gave the speech variously remembered as the “Malaise” speech or the “moral equivalent of war,” outlining what he hoped would be America’s first real national energy policy.

So the question of the day is naturally: Is it déjà vu all over again? That is, does the Obama administration’s aggressive push to boost clean energy and reduce dependence on foreign oil amount to a flashback to the Carter years, with everything that entails?

The National Journal has an interesting roundtable on that very question this week. The thrust of the half-dozen or so responses so far…